As Asa said in his blog: "Complain away." Hopefully they don't bow to the pressure; jag says he's just ignoring the e-mails. The IBPhoenix guys are just doing this because they have no legal recourse. And why aren't they targeting the other Firebird software projects that Asa mentioned in the previous renaming MZ post? Why, because Mozilla's a high-profile application and the others aren't. That's not reason enough to change the name from Firebird, I feel.

Just to clarify, this blog post was made before any of the RDBMS noise started and it was specifically directed at all of the people involved in the Phoenix renaming discussion that's been going on for about 5 months in the Phoenix forums.

I think it's also worth noting that I have been responding to all of the emails I've gotten that were human written. I'm not responding to the auto-generated spam that's being encouraged somewhere but I am doing what I can to respond to real concerns expressed by real human beings (as opposed to the web form or whatever it is that's generating the form letters).

Asa, please stay truthful.
Mine was the first email sent to you from a Firebird Project Admin, and you *still* haven't answered it. And, yes, I wrote it myself and I have a legitmate claim to being human.

I don't see an email from anything like helebor in my inbox. What's your email address? Can you give me a word or two to search on? I'm sorry if I missed your mail but I certainly don't see anything from a Helen Borrie addressed to me.

FWIW Mine has not received a reply either. I've read more untrue and biased statements (I am not necessarily talking about this particular one) in the last 24 hours than in three years of Firebird lists. I think this must mean something.

I'm sure it'd be easier for Asa to dig thru his inbox if he didn't have a jillion e-mails pouring in from any Joe Blow zealot user of Firebird (not that there aren't Moz zealots of the same frame-of-mind) who ran across the page asking them to e-mail Asa. But that's just my guess.

"We at IBPhoenix think that having a browser and a database with the same name in the same space will confuse the market, especially as browsers and databases are often used in the same applications."

I don't think so. Only a very small group of people should know what database is used on the backend of a web-based system. Additionally, the web-based system should work on any browser, so there is no reason to refer to the Firebird browser in particular. The only people I can think of that would get confused is developers, if they discovered a problem using the Firebird browser and said simply "I found a bug in Firebird." But they shouldn't be referring to the database by the name Firebird anyway, because ideally the server will be set up so that any database can be used in place of Firebird.

Does anyone really think they're going to get confused between the Firebird database and the Firebird browser? If so, could you explain the scenario where this would occur?

"Does anyone really think they're going to get confused between the Firebird database and the Firebird browser? If so, could you explain the scenario where this would occur?"

I don't think it would, although I don't necessarily agree with your reasoning. Most of your post appears to deal with confusion after someone has obtained both products; the relevant "confusion" wrt trademark deals with the attempt to obtain the product or information about it.

Look at it this way. If someone is Googling for the Firebird database, and end up at the Firebird browser web site, is there a reasonable chance they'd be confused enough to think they had found the database site? If yes, then there may be basis for a claim of infringement. However, I'd think the chances of that happening are pretty remote. Anybody who knows enough about database software to be looking for it isn't going to make that mistake.

so this is compaint really doesnt hold much water. last week, before mozillas announcement, a search for firebird would turn up TONS of different products (cars, applications, database servers), adding mozilla into the fold doesnt change this. honestly, if you pick a common word as your project name, you are asking for this to happen.

lastly, as Mozilla will call it "Mozilla FireBird" i really *really* dont see how anyone is going to be confused.

Does anyone really think they're going to get confused between the Firebird database and the Firebird browser? If so, could you explain the scenario where this would occur?

ALL of my customers have a Firebird DATA Browser ( FirebirdExplorer ) to Browse their data directly, and currently they use Mozilla for the html/PHP stuff. I have just completed updating the on-line manuals to refer to Mozilla and Firebird - how the hell do I differentiate them if they have the same names ?

That is fine in the user levels, but I have installation manuals and configuration material as well. I may be able to manage that - but on the other hand would Opera be easier to use <g>
The point I was trying to get across is that browsing Firebird DATA is a direct conflict that Asa is saying does not exist.
If I have to call it Mozilla Browzer - why can't Mozilla ?

Although most browser users are unaware of it, Mozilla recently added native SQL support. http://bugzilla.mozilla.org/buglist.cgi?product=Browser&component=SQL%3A+Native+Database+Support I believe that could be the cause of some confusion that would have legal teeth. I'm not a lawyer, but as I understand it, a critical concern for trademark infringement is potential market confusion.

I assume the browser formerly known as Phoenix picked up this SQL support from the Mozilla codebase when it was added. If it did, then people may well ask: did the FireBird browser use FireBird database technologies to add support? I know the answer is no, but many will not know that or may be confused.

Granted, very few people are aware of SQL support in Mozilla and it is certainly not a primary function of the Web browser, so the danger of market confusion is probably small. If the official name will be Mozilla FireBird (which feels more like spin than the original plan) then the issue is smaller. I just dislike the idea of trampling on the FireBird database's name because even if the official name is Mozilla FireBird, it will be called simply FireBird.

just since two projects both support "feature x" in no way suggests that they are the same kind of product. what fool would confuse a WEB BROWSER with a DATABASE SERVER? the notion is rediculous on its surface, give it up.

> Now lets suppose that Joe User (my customer with my software on his machine) has
> had a sys-admin come in and put Firebird, the browser, on his machine. Take that
> one step further and sys-admin gal forgot to mention this to Joe User. Not unusual?

So ? does a sys-admin install a program as a sys-admin ? Can it then be deleted by any
user ?

> So, when Joe User reads my uninstall instructions that say, "remove Firebird
> database system from your computer", do you think he is going to be so careful and
> actually look through the entire list provided on the "Add/Remove Programs" dialog.

I guess he wouldn't look the /entire/ list. But when you open the "add/remove progs"
window, the applications are sorted *by name*. Supposing Firebird DB and Mozilla
Firebird use the same name in the list ("Firebird"), the user will see two programs called
"Firebird". Will (s)he then pick randomly one to uninstall ?

Easy one. I distribute a commercial product that is available on Linux and Windows. To keep things simple I'm gonna concentrate on my Windows customers.

First of all, my product is not a Web based anything. It is a standalone java application which accesses the Firebird DB via a JDBC driver. The product is extremely specialized (large scale aviation simulations) and the market is limited. A company the size of Bechtel probably would have 2 copies of this application in total.

Now, I depend upon the Firebird DB installer to setup the Firebird DB in the proper location(s), write registry entries etc. Installation of my app is a relatively clean process.

But, where one point of confusion starts to arise is when a user wants to delete my application. I give them instructions on what must be removed and how to remove those same items to restore their system back to pre-my-software status.

In Windows this involves opening up the Add/Remove Programs dialog. This dialog lists, usually one or two words only per application, the applications which are available for removal.

Now lets suppose that Joe User (my customer with my software on his machine) has had a sys-admin come in and put Firebird, the browser, on his machine. Take that one step further and sys-admin gal forgot to mention this to Joe User. Not unusual?

So, when Joe User reads my uninstall instructions that say, "remove Firebird database system from your computer", do you think he is going to be so careful and actually look through the entire list provided on the "Add/Remove Programs" dialog.

Probably not. Joe, our friend will probably just see the first instance of the word Firebird, remove the associated application, and possibly screw up his computer.

That's market confusion. It happens easily when people (Joe in my example) are essentially third-parties to what is going on on their own computers.

And who will get blamed? I will.

I tend to agree, that if you are smart enough to be out looking for a SQL database system or even an open-source browser on your own then you're probably not going to have market confusion.

But, as in my example, a lot of examples can be envisioned where the ultimate software recipient is a third party with very little knowledge of what is actually happening.

Thus, via the logic above, and other reasons, I consider having two software products which could easily find themselves installed together having the same identifier to be a problem.

"But, where one point of confusion starts to arise is when a user wants to delete my application. I give them instructions on what must be removed and how to remove those same items to restore their system back to pre-my-software status."

So give them proper instructions. Also, you can have an Uninstall in the Windows apps menu like all other real projects.

"In Windows this involves opening up the Add/Remove Programs dialog."

Not if you have an Uninstall in your apps menu list.

"Now lets suppose that Joe User (my customer with my software on his machine) has had a sys-admin come in and put Firebird, the browser, on his machine. Take that one step further and sys-admin gal forgot to mention this to Joe User. Not unusual?"

"So, when Joe User reads my uninstall instructions that say, "remove Firebird database system from your computer", do you think he is going to be so careful and actually look through the entire list provided on the "Add/Remove Programs" dialog."

I happen to work for corporate America, and when programs need to be installed or uninstalled, Joe User doesn't do it. Any corporation with any sense whatsoever has an IT department to deal with that. If they don't, and they really request their users to do it for them, they provide step by step instructions to do so. And again, no corporation that I know (at least not one entirely composed of geeks) does this.

"Probably not. Joe, our friend will probably just see the first instance of the word Firebird, remove the associated application, and possibly screw up his computer."

If so, that's because someone didn't give him good enough instructions.

"I happen to work for corporate America, and when programs need to be installed or uninstalled,
Joe User doesn't do it. Any corporation with any sense whatsoever has an IT department to deal
with that."

James, I assure you, there is life outside rich countries :) Note:
significant amount of Firebird users are resident in Brasil and Russia.
I work for Bereg Ltg, paper trader #1 in Russia, we have 112 filials on
all ex-USSR territory, on the space of 8 time zones and have IT
department of 5 mans in headquarters in Saint Petersburg only. We make
phone-based support, my head in Petersburg, users eyes and hands in
Vladivostok. It usually looks like:

- Press F2.
- Pressed.
- What do you see?
- Nothing.
- How many keys do you pressed?
- Two.
- Release them and press one key at the upper left corner of clipboard.

One of main advantages of our Firebird RDBMS in compare to commercial
ones is it is one-click installable and zero-administrated, we usually
make support of our applications, not Firebird software. Mozilla guys
knocks the ground from under our legs. If mentioned user will install
Mozilla Firebird (or ask more advanced friend to make it), I'm doomed
to get wrong answers on questions like "Do you have Firebird started?"
"In which directory Firebird is installed", "What version of Firebird
is installed on your computer". As a result I doomed to listen accusations:
"Your damned software don't work, we lose money, for what on Earth do
you get your salary?"

The problem with your comparison is that you are assuming that Mozilla Firebird is going to be listed as Firebird in the Add/Install application listing. Both Mozilla Firebird can do their little part to avoid the so confusion you mention. Firebird browser can appear listed as Mozilla Firebird and the other can be listed as Firebird DB. Will regular endusers of Firebird DB be installing and unistalling your database. Last time I check you downloadable Firebird DB did not even have an installer. (to me Firebird DB has "geek" written all over it)

> The problem with your comparison is that you are assuming that Mozilla Firebird is going to be listed as Firebird in the Add/Install application listing.

Well, that might be stretching it. But, it's never good to have two variations of the same thing, in this case a name, that somebody will need to choose between.

You really have to think in terms of computer literate people who want to get things done as quickly as possible, with as little thought involved as possible. They are not thinking in terms of "Am I deleting the right thing?" Their, thinking, "Ah, Firebird, that's it, poof, it's gone."

> Firebird browser can appear listed as Mozilla Firebird and the other can be listed as Firebird DB

That's great, but who is going to go back and fix all of those installations that I already have out there? They exist and are already in usage. I'm sure my story could be repeated often by others.

If you're voluteering then I'd love to hear from you.

> Will regular endusers of Firebird DB be installing and unistalling your database.

Absolutely. Already been done. The clients are usually civil engineering types. Smart, usually somewhat computer literate, often working in a consulting type environment.

The engineering consulting type environments in this case often are "offices" of much larger organizations. Thus, the offices may only be twenty or thirty people. Often these offices are just big enough for maybe one sysadmin, sometimes not.

But, since the product is usually used by only one or two people in the office there is no need for a backend db server situation, so the DB gets installed on one or two machines maximum. The direct user's machine in this case. And most times the end-user installs it. I've seen it done hundreds of times.

Also, the usage is project oriented, not strictly form/record oriented, so it is difficult for multiple people to actually work on the same data simultaneously and the result make any sense when done.

> Last time I check you downloadable Firebird DB did not even have an installer.

Oh, Firebird has a very nice installer, at least on Windows. I haven't had time to try the Linux version yet, but I do have people asking for it!

> (to me Firebird DB has "geek" written all over it)

I believe you are being a tad bit narrow minded in this case. That is not meant as a derogatory statement! I actually sorta agree with you.

Personally, to me, anything beyond a hand maintained spreadsheet database of material has geek written all over it. Think about it. If you even have an inkling of an idea what a relational database is then you're pretty darn geeky.

But, if you need a relational DB that can handle 400 tables and 3000 triggers with ease then you usually start thinking big, Oracle type big.

Firebird can handle it. I cannot attest to it's speed, that's beyond me. But, it's certainly perfect for the case where Access type DBs are small potatoes, MySQL type DBs don't have the feature set, and Oracle type DBs could cost a bundle.

And if you need it easily deployed and used then definitely Firebird is the way to go.

I know this is probably a mistake (there goes my website's bandwidth for the month), but if you would like to try Firebird as used in my app on Windows, go to http://www.airporttools.com/apecs/sdk/vs/download.

Download the beta app, please be kind, it needs lots of work, has no direct usage documentation yet (tons of indirect docs though) and it's just two of us working on it. But, it is functional for those in the know.

I downloaded the Windows version of Firebird DB and there is no installer included. It is even stated in a readme file that the installer must be downloaded separatelly. If a "computer geek" unistall his/her Firebird DB by mistake when uninstalling a program listed as Mozilla Firebird, then we have a problem. His 'geek" title must be taken away. I don't see many grandpas and grandmas using Firebird DB. Firebird (the database) is the one showin a confusing name. Why not calling it FirebirdSQL, after all the BBS project people who predate the database people called theirs Firebird BBS and Mozillai is calling their version Mozilla Firebird.

Mozilla Firebird will always have a market share significantly higher than Firebird DB. In any case you will benefit from the fact that many people doing a google search for Firebird the browser end up finding Firebird DB instead. Bunch of hypocrites. What would happen if thye BBS people would come forward and ask you to drop your name? The re is a saying in Spanish: "Ensuciando el agua para despues tener que tomarsela" (Muddling the water that later you will have to drink)

I downloaded the Windows version of Firebird DB and there is no installer included. It is even stated in a readme file that the installer must be downloaded separatelly. If a "computer geek" unistall his/her Firebird DB by mistake when uninstalling a program listed as Mozilla Firebird, then we have a problem. His 'geek" title must be taken away. I don't see many grandpas and grandmas using Firebird DB. Firebird (the database) is the one showin a confusing name. Why not calling it FirebirdSQL, after all the BBS project people who predate the database people called theirs Firebird BBS and Mozillai is calling their version Mozilla Firebird.

Mozilla Firebird will always have a market share significantly higher than Firebird DB. In any case you will benefit from the fact that many people doing a google search for Firebird the browser end up finding Firebird DB instead. Bunch of hypocrites. What would happen if thye BBS people would come forward and ask you to drop your name? The re is a saying in Spanish: "Ensuciando el agua para despues tener que tomarsela" (Muddling the water that later you will have to drink)

I guess there is one more Phoenix in the namespace! "AOL legal approves it." Is that something like the passage of time for immutability? Maybe they could 'unapprove it'. In anycase users can always nickname it.

Jesus Christ, how low is that, they are practically encouraging people to spam Mozilla maintainers, poor asa :(
(notice the link with ALL the cc's?)

Just goes to show how low some people will go, and this is even a company? Shame on you... grow up

The fact of the matter is that Firebird (the browser) will get more PR than the database, which I personally didn't know about before all this, and that is why Firebird (the database) is mad... Why didn't the database people just register the name?

Note that they don't need to register the name for it to be protected; all they have to have done is use it in a commercial context first. Registered trademark protection is much stronger, of course, but it's not necessary to claim ownership of a term in commercial context. I don't know that it matters in this case, though; it would seem that the products are different enough that no infringement is occurring. However, given the state of U.S. courts, there's probably a judge out there somewhere who would see it otherwise.

As someone else pointed out, if someone is that worried about having a unique claim to a name, they shouldn't use a generic word. It's a sure-fire guarantee of problems.

Do you have another method that they as a community can use to express their disapproval? It is usually pretty common to let people with influence know that there are a large number of people that see a problem. Good grief, that concept is what Bugzilla is built around. So before you go shaming someone, try to see things from their side.
I happen to have Firebird installed on my laptop, and I think Firebird is a lousy name. What does the name Firebird have to do with Mozilla anyway?
And just because their are 5 other products with the same name makes it a good idea to add a 6th? That kind of justification just doesn't hold water for me.

"I happen to have Firebird installed on my laptop, and I think Firebird is a lousy name."
I should have said "I happen to have Firebird (the database) installed on my laptop, and I think Firebird is a lousy name for a browser."

"I happen to think Firebird is a lousy name for a database. What does Firebird have to do with
datebases anyway?"

Easy to answer: name reflect our history. Our predecessor, Borland
InterBase, was near to be killed by owner due to profit was much less
than from Delphi/BCB departments. InterBase Developers Initiative group
led community under catchwords "Save InterBase", partly as a result
Borland made last step (as they planned) - opened source and said they
have intention to detach department as separated company to control Open
Source project. This was'nt done and group of volunteers took source
and revived RDBMS from ash.

Best regards, Alexander V.Nevsky. If somebody want to know my email,
I don't make secret from it - ded@hq.bereg.net

>> It is usually pretty common to let people with influence know that there are a large number of people that see a problem. Good grief, that concept is what Bugzilla is built around. <<

Uhm no, that idea is one of the main problems with bugzilla. Developers are actively giving up on Mozilla due to all the whining and useless comments _in_ bugzilla that they have to sift through to get any actual work done. The idea behind bugzilla is to let developers and knowledgeable testers quickly and easily share technical information to help fix bugs. Politics, bickering, whining, "me too" posts, and all that belongs in the newsgroups. (Well, actually a lot of that doesn't even belong in the newsgroups, but at least it definitely doesn't belong in bugzilla.)

Mozilla doesn't want disapproval ;) - mozilla doesn't care about people expressing their disapproval. We're not here for the end users. We're here for the product, and that is what matters.

"We're not here for the end users. We're here for the product, and that is what matters." This statement has got to be the biggest piece of BS that I've ever heard. Could you please explain who the product is for? Whose going to use it if the end-user isn't? Lord, I hope that the developers don't subscribe to this viewpoint.

This is an open-source project. It is built by the developers for the joy of the doing and producing, for the challenge, and for the recognition. You can hope away, but that really is why the developers work on the project: not for the end-users but for themselves.

It is free to download and use, so if people like it and want to use it, so much the better. If they POLITELY suggest things that could make it better or help out with triaging problems or something more active (NOT to be confused with "activism") so much the better.

If this is the biggest piece of BS you have heard I fear what a stunting effect your sheltered lifestyle has had on your personality, especially in regards to your ability to reason logically and interact with others. You posts reenforce my fears. At the very least I know you have never followed politics.

Back on topic, the grandparent of this post is NOT BS, it is the hallmark of open-source development. Please post you mailing address and one of us will be happy to ship you a clue...

I feel sorry for your self centric viewpoint. But from my point of view (which is not "sheltered" by the way...I write database applications, some for profit and some for charity), it's ALL about the users. The satisfaction comes from make the users happy, because ultimately they are the ones stuck using the application. I don't think I'll post my mailing address, because obviously you don't have a clue to mail me.

I think you have mistaken me for a Mozilla developer, which I am not. I AM an end-user, but one who grasps the concepts a bit better than you, it seems...

You write apps for profit? Well then they damn well better be all about the users or else you would find yourself out of work pretty quickly, yeah? Your point of view is completely valid and well reasoned, in the context of you getting paid for this devel work by those who will consume it. Even in the charity case, you are making a product for the charity to use and though done for free, it is still done for the users' benefit.

See? I just agreed that you have a valid point.

Now I stop agreeing. Mozilla the project exists for developers who want to create Mozilla. Bugzilla (Mozilla's copy, not the project) exists to track bugs and feature requests for the Mozilla project, not to be some sort of general discussion forum for people who choose to use the fruits of the developers' labor.

Feel free to admit that you were wrong any time now. Even if only for the "... biggest piece of BS that I've ever heard..." crack, which was uncalled-for, and pretty obviously wrong. While you are at it, you might admit that you were wrong in saying that Bugzilla exists for the community to express their disapproval, which is ALSO patently false and in fact the only reason Sander corrected you in the first place.

I understand the desire to use hyperbole in saying "biggest piece", but I was trying to reign you in a bit, first by pointing out that it was a true and correct statement, not BS, and then stating that even if I WAS wrong at it was BS it could not possibly be the biggest piece you ever heard or else you are a hermit. Forgive me for using hyperbole to express this, but as they say, those in glass houses...

I'm not sure which concepts you believe to be grasping better, but "IF" you developed applications, which you admit you do not, I would never hire you NOR would I recruit you for an open source project, for that kind of attitude would inhibit your contribute to any useful project. As far as my "biggest piece" comment, I firmly stand by it. Software that is not usable by it's target audience is worthless trash. Developers who do not take into account the needs of their target audience will soon lose their target audience. This concept is so plain that I find it hard to believe that you are choosing to take issue with it. Perhaps when you get a little more experience under your belt. At any rate, you can go ahead and post your last word...I tire of this thread.

>> "We're not here for the end users. We're here for the product, and that is what matters."
This statement has got to be the biggest piece of BS that I've ever heard. Could you please explain who the product is for? <<

The _product_ is for the end users (after having gone through distributors).
_We_ are not. mozilla.org is not. bugzilla is not. Where end users come back to us with _useful_ feedback (cold hard technical details on problems, automatic crash reports, and very, _very_ rarely an innovative request for enhancement) and give back more to the product then they take (particularly time-wise), they become testers or contributors, and we are most happy to have them. We'll even help them and teach them so they in turn can better help us back.
But most end users aren't like that. Most end users only take. Which they are free to do - as long as they limit it to the product. But they're not free to take our time, to think they have _any_ right to demand things of us, to whine in bug and start up petty bickering and make bugs near impossible to be fixed by cluttering them with hundreds of comments that are useless to the actual _fixing_ of the bug.

You know how I know this? By being the first kind of user. I'm most definitely not a developer. I don't have any responsibility for the product. If I see whining in a bug, I can stop reading and go do something more interesting with my time. And yet I'm very much aware of how much whining there is. Can you imagine what it's like for the actual developers?

(And thus the main reason I spend time triaging bugs and helping out answering questions in places like this is to take off some of that load from developers so they can continue spending time on developing this most awesome of products. I might give more to mozilla than I take, but they have given _me_ even more.)

Have you red anything about Mozilla during the past year ?
http://www.mozilla.org/start/1.0/faq/general.html#1.1

Let me quote the first item of the FAQ :
"1.1. For whom is Mozilla 1.0 intended?
Mozilla 1.0 is a fully functional technology demo for those interested in seeing what can
be done with Mozilla technology, and those who want to create Mozilla-based products
and packages. "

"The Mozilla project, backed heavily by AOL's (Quote, Company Info) and Netscape, has struggled to grab market share from Microsoft's Internet Explorer and security-related problems have not helped matters much."

You wanna compare the security of a fresh Mozilla with a fresh IE? I think we all know who will win that race...

Even if it doesn't cause mass confusion (and it WILL create at least some confusion, somewhere), taking the name of an established Open Source project is seriously lame. It will cause bad-will that is totally unneeded in the OSS community.

The only reasonable thing to do is admit you screwed the pooch, and pick a new name. It's not too late!

Where do you draw the line, though? There are thousands, perhaps tens of thousands, of open source projects out there. The average English speaking person's vocabulary is about 30,000 words (although I could make a case that it's significantly lower in Americans ;). Given that, there is a high probability that any name you don't make up from scratch will be similar to or the same as some OSS project.

So, do you say that only high profile projects count? How do you define that? I think a great case could be made that the database project isn't one (most OSS users I know didn't even know it existed until this flap broke out). Wouldn't it be more sensible not to get your panties in a bunch just because the generic term you like so much was also attractive to someone else?

If they're that concerned that their name be unique, they should have created one. Using a popular generic term is just asking for this to happen, and whining about it when it does the way they're doing is childish.

Do you think we didn't expect this? We did. Do you think we're going to go through months again to find a name not used? To put another name through AOL legal, etc., etc.? It's not going to happen. Done deal.

And no, we haven't screwed anything. As was posted elsewhere, there are SEVERAL open source products that include the name Firebird, not JUST the DB software. Why isn't IBPhoenix asking people to spam THOSE projects?

<quote>Do you think we're going to go through months again to find a name not used?</quote>

Well if the Firebird name is choosen over months of consideration then they are really dumb people with less brains in their head. Why are they going to make open-source projects confusing for users/admins/developers ? Instead of doing the wrong thing, they should stand side by side. This name can't be decided by a well formed group of members from mozilla. I saw many posts where mozilla users didn't like the name Firebird for the browser.

"... if the Firebird name is choosen over months of consideration then they are really dumb people with less brains in their head..."

Yeah, name calling. Perfect way to not look like an ass.

"I saw many posts where mozilla users didn't like the name Firebird for the browser"

We all did. We ALSO all saw more unique votes for Firebird than for any other name. Go read the thread at: http://www.mozillazine.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=2521

The last time the total was updated, Firebird was about 25% ahead of Sphinx. Check out: http://dweb.digitalrice.com/phx_top5names.txt

It is done. Blather all you want.

If I sound dismissive, it is because you obviously didn't read enough of the history before pulling that nugget out of your head or else you would have thought twice before posting. If AOL Legal signed off, methinks they made sure they are not going to get sued. Large company, big legal dept., high profile problems. You do the math.

"The last time the total was updated, Firebird was about 25% ahead of Sphinx. Check out: (LINK) "

http://dweb.digitalrice.com/phx_top5names.txt

However, the vote for 'FIREBIRD' IS ONLY 32 out of 688 votes or 5.3% from a list of 274 names. I don't think it could say that the majority is voting for using "FIREBIRD" to REPLACE the well known "MOZILLA".

Kovu, your attitude sucks. What saddens me is that you changed the Phoenix name because of complaints from a commercial product and a name is picked from an Open source product so you know they won't have much legal strength to fight it. This sucks too. Couldn't just use a fictional name? True, their call to spam sucks too, but just because they use wrong weapons doesn't mean their cause is wrong.

Firebird is a mistake, it does hurt the open source community and sheds a bad light on the mozilla project overall. I will keep using mozilla/whatever, but with some reservations from now on.

"Kovu, your attitude sucks. What saddens me is that you changed the Phoenix name because of complaints from a commercial product and a name is picked from an Open source product so you know they won't have much legal strength to fight it. "

First, Kovu didn't change any names. Second, the name was changed from Phoenix becuase there was a complaint from another _web_browser_maker_. How were we to know that _one_ of the many existing firebird software projects - and there are many that were apparently all living happily together last week - would have such a problem with one more product partially sharing the name. Why accuse us of assuming that there'd even be a need for such discussion, much less a legal fight, when anyone looking at the list of happily co-existing firebird project a week ago wouldn't have found a single mention of conflict or confusion?

That the Firebird database wasn't even close to the first firebird software project (and not even the first open source project) and seemingly saw no conflict in using the already popular English word "firebird" in their name, how was anyone to predict that they'd have such a problem with others using the name?

By you I meant the "mozilla organization" not you personally. I am sorry if my language offended you.

Anyway, as I posted in other threads focusing on the legal aspects of the matter misses the point. As I understand it, nobody is looking at legal fights, and an argument such as "they can sue us if they wish" just sucks from an open source contributor like you (I see your @mozilla.org as part of your email). It hurts the open source community AND the mozilla project.

First, this is not a replacement. Mozilla is Mozilla. Phoenix is now Firebird as it can't be Phoenix anymore. Firebird and Thunderbird will BECOME the Mozilla Browser and Mail/News components at a later date, replacing the XPFE versions of these components in future milestones.

Second, yeah it got like 5.4% of the votes. But as everyone was asked to vote for their top 5 names, it could NEVER have more than 20% of the vote, even if EVERYONE voted for Firebird (and assuming that every vote followed the rules). The math isn't perfect, but Firebird aparently got a vote from about 27% of the people who voted, compared to Sphinx which got a vote from about 22% of the people or Fox/Phox which got a vote from 17% of the voters.

Of the 274 names on the list you somehow neglected to mention that some 168 of those (like Phalus and Priapus) got a single vote each. In fact, only 24 names got 7 or more votes (votes from more than 5% of the vote-casters). The top 32 names got just under half the votes cast, by themselves.

Now that was fun, wasn't it? Mmmmm... Math...

Still, neither your 5.3% number or any of my numbers above matter a single bit.

Let me return to my original point (which you obviously missed since you decided to quote me percentages) which is that Phoenix is now Firebird. Done. That's it. I only mentioned the fact that it got the most votes to prove that the original poster hadn't done research. "Lots of people disliked it" is a very weak arguement for the claim originally made (not that the name-calling was a strong case), and I was simply offering some counter-proof.

I did get a little off track in pointing out to the original poster that for what little it might matter, Firebird DID get the most votes in a totally un-scientific poll, but where exactly did I claim that the majority wanted to rename Phoenix to Firebird? Where did I claim that was even a valid point to debate?

Firebird is a common word, related to Phoenix and the whole "rise from the ashes" thing that inspired the original name, acceptable to the DEVELOPERS (who are the only ones who REALLY get a vote), prefered in a crappy little poll (for what its worth), acceptable to at least a chunk of the Mozilla/Phoenix community (for what its worth, and I'm not making any claims about the percentages involved), and MOST importantly has the blessing of the folks in AOL Legal.

Only those who read the forums, and the Phoenix forum in particular, would have seen it (was the poll -- much less the idea that such a poll would effectively decide the name -- ever mentioned on the Mozillazine front page?). Plus, AFIAK, the poll was conducted at a time when the question being decided was "what should the name of this side-project be," not "what should the name of the Mozilla browser component be?" I doubt that there would have been quite as much of an issue if the product weren't taking over as the new Mozilla-the-browser.

It really comes down to the fact that this "Open Source" organisation did a sleazy thing. They chose a name that was already in use. They didn't buy this name, they just decided to stomp all over the existing products out there. Does it really matter that there are already 5+ projects with this name, the name of the new mozilla browser is going to stomp all over the existing ones. It's a no-brainer.

If Microsoft called their new "mega hype every magazine has ads" product which is destined to be hugely successful, Postgres, the open source comunity would be outraged. Just because the Mozilla is a popular product and these other ones are largely unknown, doesn't mean the organisation behind it isn't showing itself to be a bunch of thoughtless arseholes.

That the X number of marketing, developers and business people involved in this organisation couldn't come up with an original name and decided that they are legally safe, is pretty amazing. For godsakes they were changing a name because of product confusion with a BIOS maker that could sue, and chose instead a muddled name that is used by people who can't sue.

No way anyone will sue, but at least they have a right to be pissed off.

Again, there are MULTIPLE projects, not JUST IBPhoenix, even OPEN SOURCE projects other than the DB project, that use the name Firebird. Why do they wait until now to start complaining? Well, likely because they WEREN'T the first open source project to use it. In Asa's words:

"Don't forget the Firebird BBS project. Looks like they've been around for a while. And don't leave off the freeware/shareware projects like Firebird T-Sync (NTP client for win32). Oh, and don't forget about the other commercial applications and organizations like the Firebird Mortgate Application or Firebird Software Ltd."

The simple fact of the matter is, most of the people who are leaping to the defense of mozilla.org here would also be the first to moan of Microsoft released a browser called MySQL (obviously they never would, but you see my point).

MySQL is NOT a generic term, therefor your comparison is bogus. Anyone can use SQL moniquer because it's just and acronym for Structure Query Language ( it is the standard language for relational database management systems), but once you attach a prefix or sufix to it, it is made unique and copyrightable/trademarkable.

When using generic words, the issue shifts. Can you trademark Word? I don't think so ... but you can trademark MS Word. That's why it was possible to have Lotus Word Pro as a trademark. and before MS Word we had WordStar and WordPerfect. (All these products were in exactly the same market)

Microsoft is an abusive monopoly. Mozilla is not. I know the Mozilla.org guys, and they work really, really hard. They don't need to be haggling with this silliness. No legal issues > No need to change the name again.

"Again, there are MULTIPLE projects, not JUST IBPhoenix, even OPEN SOURCE projects other than the DB project, that use the name Firebird. "<P>
All the MORE reason that this name is a bad idea!! <P>
"Why do they wait until now to start complaining?"<P>
Perhaps because it was just recently announced?! <P>
It's hard for me to believe that an Open Source project would make such as decision that could not be undone without due reconsideration called for by a legitimate and significant community. The only explanation that I can think of is that this particular Open Source project is too closely controlled by commercial interests.

>It's hard for me to believe that an Open Source project would make such as decision that could not be undone without due reconsideration called for by a legitimate and significant community.

Sounds reasonable. Dear mozilla.org decision-makers, can you please explain (a) how exactly the mozilla.org project is governed (it seems that the website contains rather general info like "Mozilla.org staff members provide the overall guidance for the project.", but probably I did not find the right page) and (b) how community members not belonging to the core developers group can express their concerns in appropriate way to be heard by a governing body.

> how community members not belonging to the core developers group can express their concerns in appropriate way to be heard by a governing body

Simple. Staff@mozilla.org can contacted via email. There are also developer newsgroups that are read by many of the staff. On the other hand, it is quite possible and reasonable to suggest that they will be more receptive to the concerns of people who have a history of contribution to the project, rather than random people complaining. I know that I would be.

""Again, there are MULTIPLE projects, not JUST IBPhoenix, even OPEN SOURCE projects other than the DB project, that use the name Firebird. "<P> All the MORE reason that this name is a bad idea!!"

No, it's what makes it so silly to hear you complaining. Too bad the other Firebird projects didn't give YOU this agony when YOU chose the name originally.

""Why do they wait until now to start complaining?" Perhaps because it was just recently announced?!""

Hmm, NO. We've been talking about renaming, and have been voting, for months now. It's not our fault that you didn't pay attention until the "boo hoo" articles started flying.

"It's hard for me to believe that an Open Source project would make such as decision that could not be undone without due reconsideration called for by a legitimate and significant community."

Being open source communities could really matter less. It doesn't give us anything in common except a desire to create good software for free. The fact is, before we change our name, you're going to have to go harass ALL those other Firebird projects into changing their names first. When you do, we still won't change it.

"The only explanation that I can think of is that this particular Open Source project is too closely controlled by commercial interests."

Nope. The Mozilla community, not Netscape, voted on the name. All AOL did was clear it for us.

All the defenders saying it's not a trademark, it's a generic word, and hey there's multiple projects out there called Firebird anyway... are missing the real point of the complaints. Yes you're right, there are other projects called Firebird. You're right that there is not likely to be real confusion about the database and the browser. But why use a generic name? People coped just fine with browsers called "Netscape" and "Mozilla" that weren't real words. Mozilla has aspirations of being a model and flagship open source project, yet it couldn't even manage to come up with a decent name that wasn't taken - generic word or not. A project Mozilla's size does have to take more care in choosing names, just as a company like MS with monopoly power must be more careful not to abuse that power. Just because other people have used that name doesn't mean adding yet another Firebird isn't a mistake. It comes down to disappointment on my part - I expected better of the Mozilla project _because_ I respect them.

"yet it couldn't even manage to come up with a decent name that wasn't taken - generic word or not. "

The same, perhaps, could be said for the Firebird DB people, who took a "generic" name that was already being used.

"I expected better of the Mozilla project _because_ I respect them."

If you respected the project, it wasn't because of the name. It's because we make a mean browser. If you lose respect because we chose a name that was already taken after YOU chose a name that was already taken, so be it.

"The same, perhaps, could be said for the Firebird DB people, who took a "generic" name that was already being used."

That is true. But once again I come back to the point that Mozilla is a large and visible project, an open-source leviathan. Elephants must be careful where they step, or things get crushed :)

" If you respected the project, it wasn't because of the name. It's because we make a mean browser."

Well, yes, of course it wasn't because of the name... but who said it was? :) When I say I respect the Mozilla project, I mean I respect the people who work on it and are involved in it.

"If you lose respect because we chose a name that was already taken after YOU chose a name that was already taken, so be it."

Hmm, who do you think I am? I didn't choose any name that's being discussed here, and I'm certainly not involved in the Firebird database, though I'd heard of it before this fracas happened. Maybe I'm just confused by your emphasis on "YOU" in the above. Let me try to clarify then.

I'm disappointed in the Mozilla project (which means the people, not the code) for choosing a name so unwisely, being one that so obviously stomps on other projects. The fact that people (eg. Asa?) mention that a number of other open-source projects use this name only makes it worse! To me, it just means m.o knowingly stepped on the toes of 5 other projects instead of 1. Two wrongs don't make a right, and 6 Firebirds don't mean any of the last 5 were well-named... but it's worse in Mozilla's case because they're such a large and high-profile project.

Yet all this was easily avoidable by picking a new non-generic name, which both Netscape and Mozilla were, and presumably those names were at some point vetted by lawyers too. For an organisation which (unlike many OSS projects) has the luxury of some full time paid staff, it seems odd they couldn't manage to choose a 3rd browser name more wisely.

"But once again I come back to the point that Mozilla is a large and visible project, an open-source leviathan. Elephants must be careful where they step, or things get crushed :) "

I don't buy that. How is what Mozilla did in partially adopting a well used name for one of it's applications any differnt than that the RDBMS folks did to the pre-existing and probably much smaller open source BBS project? No one is "crushed". The BBS project isn't crushed. They appear to be doing just fine. There have been quite a few firebird software projects happily co-existing for years and one more app in the mix called Mozilla Firebird should not have been problematic.

"The fact that people (eg. Asa?) mention that a number of other open-source projects use this name only makes it worse! To me, it just means m.o knowingly stepped on the toes of 5 other projects instead of 1. Two wrongs don't make a right, and 6 Firebirds don't mean any of the last 5 were well-named... "

I'm not claiming that two wrongs make a right. I'm saying that there have been no wrongs here at all. Where has the harm been to any of these projects by the existence of any of the others? Was the BBS project irreparably harmed by the formation of the Firbird database project? Was the database stomped all over by the Firebird Maths educational software? Other than the time wasted in this disagreement (which surely could be better spent writing and shipping great software) I just don't see where any of the myriad of firebird projects have been harmed.

If people would stop talking in such overheated language and strart talking in specifics about the actual harm (rather than this amorphose "confusion" that didn't exist in a field of many firebird software projects but somehow materialized in a field of many+1), I think we'd quickly see that it's just not a problem or that if there are minor potential problems - like packaging name conflicts, that there are simple solutions to those problems.

It was just a size analogy about an elephant's footsteps being heavy, I didn't mean for it to be taken literally regarding crushing. If you prefer, just skip that whole elephant thing and just consider that a company with MS's size/market power must be careful not to abuse that power because it's so easily done. (Of course, whether they bother to try to be careful is another matter....)

" If people would stop talking in such overheated language and strart talking in specifics about the actual harm (rather than this amorphose "confusion" that didn't exist in a field of many firebird software projects but somehow materialized in a field of many+1)"

I think the problem comes directly from what I mentioned above: size and mindshare. As people have pointed out, it is a truism that people will not genuinely confuse a browser with a database. But suppose someone says (or headlines report) that Firebird 2.0 has been released. What do you think people will take that to mean? The majority of people, who don't know about Firebird-the-database, will take this to mean Firebird the browser, possibly incorrectly. (This is what I mean by size; the visibility of mozilla.org means that now everyone will think of the name Firebird as a browser, whereas before they wouldn't know and would look it up). The minority who do know about the other Firebird projects will simply find it even more ambigous - which Firebird are we talking about here? So it's a loss in both situations.

Is this a big problem? No. Is it one that could have been avoided without too much trouble? Yes. Maybe I was using overheated language, as you put it, but I think it's clear that you didn't understand there was some depth to the disappointment. It comes down to the fact that while this isn't something that will do irreparable harm or anything (and I never claimed it would), it was needless.

To illustrate, suppose mozilla.org released a browser where HTTP was broken. Sure, no harm done, the sun will rise tomorrow, but I think people would still be justified in being disappointed with the Mozilla project if it managed to release a browser in such a state... no-one can pretend it wasn't easily avoidable with a bit of testing. And that's what it boils down to here with the name change as well. Sure sure, nothing broken, but it's not like you couldn't have picked another name. It's not as if there's a great semantic link or association with the word "Firebird" anyway.

Or better yet, suppose that mozilla.org announces that it has released Mozilla Firebird 2.0 and all the media does exactly what they do now and just copies our headline.

" I think it's clear that you didn't understand there was some depth to the disappointment. "

You're right. I was genuinely surprised that there was absolutely no confusion or disarray in a world with many projets sharing the name firebird but many+1 projects sharing the name is apparently intollerable and cause for flaming and personal insults.

"It comes down to the fact that while this isn't something that will do irreparable harm or anything (and I never claimed it would), it was needless."

If there was no harm or anything, then what was needless was all of the flamage and shrill cries (not to mention the flood of personal insults that were directed at my inbox).

"suppose mozilla.org released a browser where HTTP was broken."

Not gonna happen ;-)

"no-one can pretend it wasn't easily avoidable with a bit of testing. And that's what it boils down to here with the name change as well. Sure sure, nothing broken, but it's not like you couldn't have picked another name. It's not as if there's a great semantic link or association with the word "Firebird" anyway."

If there was no harm then there was nothing to avoid. We picked a name that had a nice association with the prior name, Phoenix, and which wasn't being used by any other web browser. If the harm is all the name-calling and ill will, I think it's unfair to pin that on us.

Sure, but you wouldn't give two of your children the same name. After all, no harm would come to them from having the same name :) So just because there's no "harm" doesn't mean that picking a different name wasn't a better idea. Frankly I'd want a unique name for my project anyway.

Regardless though, it's a done deal, so this is my last post on the topic.

Eloki, the more you argue, the more absurd and senseless your analogies get. Of course, you normally wouldn't name two of your children the same way because they have in common: 1) at least one of the parents, 2) they belong to the same class of living organisms (humans), 3) the might cary the same last names.

You might name two children with the same name and distinguish them by: 1) having a different middle name (I have seen quiete a few of theses situations), 2) have different last name.

So what's the issue? Mozilla Firebird and Firbird DB belong to two different kinds of organims, one is a database, the othe is a web browser. Why is that so hard for you to understand. Did MS sue Lotus when they introduced Lotus Word Pro? Following your silly analogies, they could have done that because people could have thought that Lotus Word Pro was the professional version of MS Word.

eloki said :
>Sure, but you wouldn't give two of your children the same name.<

indeed. But "Mozilla Firebird" and Firebird are not brothers (= not the same appl category). Do you mind having a brother-in-law bearing the same first name as you ? Would you complain to his parents ? The "Mozilla Firebird" team may have something to do with OSS (of course they do), but giving a name, whether to a chlid or to an application is something important for the application.

Eloki, you are a bit confused here. The Phoenix browser is the one getting renamed as Firebird, NOT Mozilla. Don't forget that Phoenix is not Mozilla but an offshoot, a proof of concept if you will, for a stand alone simplified browser that uses a modified toolkit/XUL. What Mozilla guys announced the other day was that Mozilla, after Moz 1.4 final is released, will start using the Phoenix developed and modified code as the new Mozilla. In other words we will have Mozilla 1.5, 1.6, etc. and most probably when it reaches a level of maturity it might be called Mozilla 2.0. The original code where Mozilla operated like a swiss knife will stop being developed by the core Mozilla developers unless other developers or ISV grab the code (open sourced, guys?) and continue its development. Phoenix (Firebird) will continue as a side project for as long developers keep working on it.

Maybe the confusion comes from the fact that Asa is involved in both projects

Well OK, here's how I see it. Phoenix was an official experiment on the part of mozilla.org. That's what I meant when I was referring to the Mozilla project, the organisation/people. As you point out, Phoenix (the official experimental browser) is now being adoped as the official mozilla.org browser release. Phoenix was obviously official enough and important enough to have AOL's lawyers approve a new name for it, so I think I'm justified in saying that the top level of mozilla.org staff are the ones with political responsibility for the new name and not merely some minor offshoot group inside the project who were politically independent of mozilla.org staff.

AOl lawyers? Fron where did you get that information? Why will AOL lawyers be involved. AOL would be involved if the Netscape division was involved in the Firebird monicker, which is not. Am sure Mozilla gets its legal advise from people that are not paid by AOL to do that (AOL employess might do it as a sideline thing, not necesarilly AOL paying them to do just that). I believe Mitchel Baker is a lawyer and who is involved with Mozilla but does not work for AOL any longer. In addition of being Mozilla chief evangelist, I believe she was directly involved with writing Mozilla's Public License qhen she WAS and AOL employee.

Mozilla is not adopting Phoenix, they are adopting THE CODE from the Phoenix project and making it the new Mozilla development trunk. As matter of fact they annonuced they will include many of the extensions (turned off) in the Mozilla release and that will be ONE of the differentiating factors.

It's surprising how people read things. Mozilla never announced they will change their name, Phoenix did. The Roadmap even mentions that after Mozilla 1.4, Mozilla will use the code from Phoenix to put together Mozilla 1.5, 1.6, etc. Phoenix (Firebird) is still at the 0.5 level. Get your story straight.

"Mozilla is not adopting Phoenix, they are adopting THE CODE from the Phoenix project and making it the new Mozilla development trunk."

Well, I think you're splitting hairs here. I'm not saying I can't be wrong, but I don't see how any of these corrections you're making bear much part on my original post. But okay, I'll examine what you said above, and as I think there's a lot of naming ambiguity in our posts, I'll be more explicitly verbose.

You say they're not adoping Phoenix, they're adopting the Phoenix code. By this I take you to mean that Mozilla-the-project is not adoping Phoenix-the-project, they are adopting Phoenix-the-codebase and making it the new Mozilla-development-codebase. But I always understood Phoenix-the-project to be an experimental browser officially supported by Mozilla-the-organisation. But from what you say above, they're not adoping Phoenix-the-project. So does this mean that Phoenix-the-project will go on? Because my assumption is that it would not.

that's false. Phoenix is not even in the projects page on the http://www.mozilla.org/ . Phoenix is a project that uses some code from the application Mozilla.

>Phoenix is now being adoped as the official mozilla.org browser release.<

That's false too ! People in the Phoenix's staff did some good job, and released their code. Mozilla developpers will re-use some of that code. Today, linux kernels developpers use Bugzilla to track bugs, does it mean that linux kernel developpers adopt Bugzilla ? Today, Apple developpers use KHTML for their new browser (Safari). Some part of the Safari code will be (at least, so they say) released, and KHTML developpers may be willing to use it. But that doesn't mean that Konqueror (which uses KHTML too) will embrace Apple's Safari !

Kovu, you are missing the point. Everybody in this thread including you an me wants one thing: the success of mozilla and its derivative. Nothing else matters.

The simple fact that we are talking about this means that we are failing that goal (at least in part). Maybe in the end we will forget about this, whether or not the Firebird name stays. In the meanwhile though relationships are hurt, people are disappointed. I am telling you my willingness to collaborate is lower than yesterday.

If this was a discussion about the quality of the name, then you would be right, it would be pointless. But the discussion is not about that. I may like Firebird as a name, but just from the reaction you must admit the choice is a failure in itself.

It is not hurting the DB I agree, it is hurting mozilla. It doesn't matter if they sue or not. Read the reaction. I am telling you, try to understand what I am saying: *I* am *disappointed* about this and *less willling* to collaborate with the mozilla project

I don't care shit about the db I care only about moz and this is hurting moz.

This hasn't hurt Mozilla at all, except the amount of spam we're having to deal with whether via e-mail, forums, or here. Try to understand what I am saying If *you* really are that *disappointed* about this meaningless drama and are *less willing* to collaborate, so be it. Mozilla's growing all the time. Lose a developer, gain ten.

Fantastic. You know better than me what hurt me and what not. For
what on Earth thousands of us spend time and nervous here? Oh, sorry,
I know, just to prove we are not hurt. This remind me recent events
started by one leader of one powerful country against small country in
the Middle East. He too certainly know better what want people of this
small country.

"If it did, they could sue. They can't, because they aren't being hurt."

One more diamond in this collection. If they have'nt enough funds to
defend, they are'nt being hurt. And again I remember this leader...

"End of story."

I'm not so shure. This, and all I said in this post, is my personal
opinion, I speak now not as Firebird Foundation member.

'If Microsoft called their new "mega hype every magazine has ads" product which is destined to be hugely successful, Postgres, the open source comunity would be outraged.'

Postgres is an invented term. They'd not only have a reason to be upset, they'd win any legal challenge.

"For godsakes they were changing a name because of product confusion with a BIOS maker that could sue"

A BIOS maker which has built a web browser into its BIOS. I personally don't think that should preclude the use of the name Phoenix, but I'm willing to bet that most trademark lawyers would disagree with me.

If Mozilla had renamed Phoenix to Postgres, then they would have a problem. But they didn't. They chose Firebird, which is a fairly common term used for a variety of products. Just as the team who created the Firebird database must have realized when choosing the name the risk of a future more widely known software product coming along bearing the same name in a different domain, the Mozilla team must also realize the risk of the same thing happening to them in the future.

Both Firebird database and Mozilla Firebird teams probably picked "Firebird" because they liked the name. If either one of them had wanted an original name, they should have choosen something more original such as "Postgres" or "Mozilla."

I never cared a lot for the name change simply because I did not care for Phoenix - I prefer Mozilla. But now that the roadmap seems to indicate that Mozilla is going to be *replaced* by FB/TB, I wonder why not use the well-established name Mozilla for them? So one could be MozillaMail or MozMail or MailMoz and same with Browser (MozillaBrowser ...)
A decent designer could have done a nice job in providing the necessary fresh art and CI.

Johann, Mozilla is not going away as a name. That would be just silly. Everyone that knows us knows us by that name. The Mozilla Firebird browser and the Mozilla Thunderbird email client are the current project names.

Hmm that does not really answer my question: if the current Mozilla gets *replaced* by Mozilla FB browser and Mozilla TB Mail, and if the name Mozilla remains, why the hassle to make the name even longer? What is the value of "Mozilla Firebird Browser" over "MozillaBrowser" when there is no danger of confusing things, since Mozilla by itself is not going to stay anyways? Just curious, personlly I do not care about names, but I know that people do and that it is considered an important part of getting a product well known and accepted.

"if the current Mozilla gets *replaced* by Mozilla FB browser and Mozilla TB Mail, and if the name Mozilla remains, why the hassle to make the name even longer? What is the value of "Mozilla Firebird Browser" over "MozillaBrowser" when there is no danger of confusing things, since Mozilla by itself is not going to stay anyways?"

And that's been a part of our naming discussion from the start. We certainly can't just flip that switch and start calling the new project Mozila Browser while the old browser suite still lives. There's likely to be considerable development happening before we're down to just one browser (we're hosting and developing both today. what do you think would have happened if Phoenix had just been called "Browser" for the last 6 months?). We're not even moving over to the next generation browser until 1.5 at the earliest and even then there's a chance that the old suite will live on, that enough people will want to see it continue that they'll keep it going.

We can't host two very different browsers (which we're doing right this moment) and call them both Mozilla or call one Mozilla and call the other Mozilla Browser and expect there to not be problems filing bugs and doing development work. When we just have one browser in the tree and that's what everyone is developing and using then we will have the luxury of not worrying about confusion between the old browser and the new. We're not there yet, as a matter of fact, the overwhelming majority of resources is and will be for a while longer, still focused on the old browser.

In next releases (1.5 ou whatever), the two first module names may be replaced by "Firebird" and "Thunderbird", which means there will be no "Mozilla Browser" anymore, which will be replaced by just "Mozilla Firebird", and not the incredibly long "Mozilla Firebird Browser".

Just like Apache, who has multiple projects under one "brand", we need subnames to differentiate the different projects. We don't want something lame like "MozBrowser" or "MozMail"; we wanted names that help "fire" us up about the fantastic browser technologies we're creating and, currently, recreating from the ashes of the former "Mozilla everything and the kitchen sink" app.

But I am having problems to have my customers adopting open source products. When I explain that I am using PHP - OK, APACHE - Fine, Firebird (the database!), and Mozilla the last two raise a few questions. I will now have to explain that I am using PHP, Apache, Firebird (The Database), Firebird (the Browser). It is NOT the kind of aggravation anyone would need.

and btw YES a lot (if not all) of my customers DO want to know what database sits behind the all singing all dancing app they use through their browsers or windows app.

No one's stopping you from calling it Mozilla. In fact, these names really are INTERNAL names. As Asa has explained, we expect that most of the rest of the world will still call it Mozilla, including us. Right now we need to differentiate between the old browser suite and the new browser-only app, and we thought Firebird was a great name (especially given that Phoenix was the original name; it's related).

In the unlikely event of Firebird the browser and Firebird the database being used in the same space, all you need to do is qualify the name (like I just did) and the confusion goes away. While I can see them being upset, I think the issue is not that serious in the grand scheme of things.

Get it right. It is Mozilla Firebird and it is a web browser. Wish everyone could get this right instead of thinking that the Mozilla name is being dropped.

The little pretty icons on your desktop will say Mozilla Firebird and probably will have a very distinctive icon as well. Mozilla Firebird is for every Internet user, it takes a open source zealot to figure out what Firebird database is and how to install/use it. Anyone who is a Firebird database user that can't figure out the difference between Mozilla Firebird and Firebird database shouldn't be using a computer.

A protential user of Mozilla Firebird will hear the browser from word-of-mouth, the media, and download sites like Download.com that use the proper full name (Mozilla Firebird) of the browser. A protential user of Firebird database will be most likely doing a search for open-source database software. Don't see how anyone can mix up the two, three, dozen, etc. software that may happen to have Firebird in the name if they know clearly that it is a web browser or a database that they are looking for. Anyone that is remotely intelligent can figure out when a web page comes up for some web browser named Mozilla Firebird and they were looking for a database that they selected the wrong site. Click the back button and try the next link shown in Google.

What next, some open source project screaming bloody hell because the word "Internet" is used in another product? Truly sad.

The developers who are using both tools are smart enough to know the difference. Their customers, who want to know what db is being used and which browser they are using will either 1) be able to distinguish by the names/icons/functions of the two products, or 2) will have to be taught the difference between Internet Explorer, and Windows Explorer anyway, so they have problems as it is.

I noticed no one tried to refute the above comment, which usually means 1) you're very far off-base, or 2) you've summed up the topic, and no one can add anything. I think the latter applies.

<quote>The little pretty icons on your desktop will say Mozilla Firebird and probably will have a very distinctive icon as well. Mozilla Firebird is for every Internet user, it takes a open source zealot to figure out what Firebird database is and how to install/use it. Anyone who is a Firebird database user that can't figure out the difference between Mozilla Firebird and Firebird database shouldn't be using a computer. </quote>

I have seen Mozilla Firebird icons which look very equal compared with the Firebird RDBMS. It seems you never answer problem-questions from users in newsgroups else you would know much better that confusing by users is quickly made !!!

That's because we've had hordes of new members come in just to complain. The actual Mozilla folks are probably ridiculously outnumbered in that poll because most of them don't care. I'm sure the numbers will become more balanced once Mozilla folks stroll in and vote.

Congraduations, because as far as I know there aren't any official Mozilla Firebird icons! Any icons that claim to be Mozilla Firebird's are unofficial ones made up by users. I have 100% confidence that the official icons will be vastly different from whatever icons the Firbird RDBMS uses.

Asa stated:
"The call-to-arms also lists the email addresses of many of the more prominent Mozilla contributors and suggests deluging them with messages".

Here is what it really says:
"You might also send mail to the following people and groups:

Asa Dotzler - he made the announcement and has been defending the Mozilla intellectual property lawyers by saying that no one could confuse a database with a browser.

drivers@mozilla.org - drivers are the project managers of Mozilla, they keep the project stable and moving forward. They should know what effect their new name has on another open source project.

These people are the technical project leaders of Mozilla. They too should be aware that the possibility for confusion exists."

Nowhere does it imply that these people should be "deluged". I guess you are extrapolating on the likelihood that quite a lot of people will want to express dismay at your incomprehensible behaviour and your (so-far-expressed) Mogul-like attitude to stamp on the legitimate dissenters by any means, fair or foul. If there's a deluge, then you can personally take the blame for it.

If you didn't write it, one of your buddies did. The distinction means little. You're all part of Mozilla, the new 500-lb gorilla of the OSS community, boorishly stomping on your neighbor without a care. If you did discuss the issues of the name change at length, as you claim, that makes it even worse. It was pre-meditated!

The poll now indicates that 76% of users are against the new name. That's a landslide, hands down. But the views of mozillaZine dissidents don't matter. This poll is a meaningless joke; nothing more than an opportunity for the Mozilla regime to mock the will of its users.

It's good for you that MozillaZine had its fundraising drive *before* you unleashed this attack on the OSS community and offense against your own user base. You've flushed an awful lot of goodwill down the toilet. I hope the AOL lawyers are enjoying their lighter work load as a result of not having to carry out the Herculean task of approving another name for a web browser. Maybe you can solicit donations from *them* next time.

The distinction means everything. She accused Asa of writing the "deluge" statement and he did not.

And the poll could matter less, given that it's been "deluged" with new members flocking in just to vote, spam, or otherwise bother us. Mozilla folks don't care enough to vote; I haven't. Why? Because the name is changed and it's not changing again.

Get a grip. MozillaZine isn't part of Mozilla.org. If you have a problem with something that Mozilla.org has done, take it over there. They have newsgroups that you can post in to talk about whatever it is that you want to talk about.

It said so in a WEB-POLL? I guess that is settled then! Maybe Phallus WOULD have been a better choice....

...

I mock you. Mock, mock mock. I would mock you less if your argument made sense.

"500-lb gorilla"? That sure is jingoism, but it isn't even very good jingoism. Wait, I spoke too soon. "Mozilla regime" is worse.

Of course the poll is meaningless. It is a fucking Web Poll. A point of contention, though. MozillaZINE put up the poll on the MozillaZINE page. This poll was not put up by Mozilla(full stop) nor is it on the Mozilla.Org page. Methinks you are not where you think you are.

What project has Mozilla muscled out, sue into oblivion, or otherwise unfairly influenced? A DB who ALREADY shares a common name with SEVERAL other products, including open-source ones? How so? Because they said so? Offer some proof that they HAVE BEEN harmed (no future-impact speculation, thank you very much) or stop babbling about great apes. You are offending an endangered species.

"...(Mozilla) unleashed this attack on the OSS community and offense against (Mozilla's) own user base... "

Uh, ok. That is all you. I don't even have the words.

They moved a project from a legally unusable name to a legally usable name (which means the same thing as the unusable one) and this is how you view it? Fine. I now doubt both your sanity and your perception of reality, but give you full marks for your willingness to be blindly militant. Kudos to you.

hehe Wow, I really sent you over the edge, didn't I? Get a grip, it's just a WEB-POST. :) Believe it or not, I actually had had more flammable hyperbole in my comment but deleted it before I posted. Sorry for the blow-up.

There are two issues. One is the name change issue: *Since it was known* that the use of Phoenix/Firebird would become mandatory to continue using a current Mozilla-made browser, there has been ZERO discussion of a new name. There hasn't been enough TIME for a discussion; it's been only a matter of days since the road map was unveiled. Many of us were content with Mozilla, so we had no idea what was being discussed in the Phoenix forums. Any news about Phoenix, I mostly blocked out. Mozilla was my browser. Now I am hearing that the discussion was already held?! Not since the radical road map change. A large portion of Mozilla users were not engaged or even aware of that alleged discussion. We did not know that the rug was about to pulled out from under us. I think most of us do agree that the road map change is generally good, but it's as if we were "tricked" (by fate; not intentionally) into not participating in the name change discussion because it pertained to a browser that we had no intention of using. Unfortunately, this point is completely lost on Kovu et al. Actually, I think the sad reality is that they just don't care.

That leads to the second issue, which is really what is blowing the first issue out of proportion: respect, or lack thereof. I'm in shock at the attitude of Asa and Kovu. They don't seem to care *at all* what Mozilla users think. I am not some Firebird DB developer who just migrated over here with that crowd in the last couple days. I've been a registered MZ member for years, and I voted that the Firebird name was unfair to the database project. (My second choice would've been "don't like" or "hate.") Kovu is relentlessly, systematically smacking down everybody in these threads who doesn't like the new names. The opposition to the bird names is vehement and overwhelming, but their response basically amounts to: "Shut up. We do what we want." It is demeaning and arrogant, dismissive without justification, and violates the spirit of OSS.

Asa has frequently had a scowling tone when responding to complaints. MZ puts up these "talkback" boards for the apparent purpose of soliciting comments, opinions, and advice. But now they are chewing out people for giving "back-talk." Their behavior is untenable and most unfriendly. Mozilla users post comments here expecting that their input will be respected. As of late, this place has become a flogging forum. Regular Mozilla enthusiasts are having their views trashed and motives impugned (i.e., charging that anybody who speaks out against the Firebird browser name *must* have a vested interested in the DB) by the developers. A dark cloud is over the Mozilla "community," if you can still call it that.

"Kovu is relentlessly, systematically smacking down everybody in these threads who doesn't like the new names."

It's not a question of liking. Who the hell likes "seamonkey"? I don't, but I never bitched about it. We are talking internal codenames, and necessary ones at that. And if you didn't like the names, after they're announced isn't the time to complain about it. It's a done deal. I don't want mozilla.org staffers wasting any more time on this silly nonsense; I want them working on Mozilla.

"their response basically amounts to: "Shut up. We do what we want.""

No, it basically amounts to "we've done no harm to anyone, and as such we see no reason to change anything."

"What project has Mozilla muscled out, sue into oblivion, or otherwise unfairly influenced? A DB
who ALREADY shares a common name with SEVERAL other products, including open-source
ones? How so? Because they said so? Offer some proof that they HAVE BEEN harmed (no
future-impact speculation, thank you very much) or stop babbling about great apes. You are
offending an endangered species."

I tried to be extremely polite during all discussions but my
patience is close to be exhausted. Mozilla guys, maybe it is enough to
make from youselves clowns who don't understand difference between small
projects oriented on experienced computer users who certainly will not
be confused by any namespace intersecton and confusion between RDBMS
client software and browser, which are both installed on nearly any
computer in the world used by people who think programs are running
within monitor and system box is needed only to stick CD into it.

I would just like to say that throughout this entire (ridiculously inflammatory) discussion, you were one of the few real voices of reason. Almost nobody else managed to be patient, polite, avoid reacting to flaming and disrespect, or stayed on-topic for as long as you did.

Thank you for staying calm - the discussion would've been fairly unreadable without you.

"Asa stated: 'The call-to-arms also lists the email addresses of many of the more prominent Mozilla contributors and suggests deluging them with messages'."

Asa didn't say that. I did.

"Here is what it really says: 'You might also send mail to the following people and groups...' Nowhere does it imply that these people should be 'deluged'."

After the "You might also..." bit, the page goes on to list 26 email addresses. I think that's encouraging a deluge. Maybe you disagree. But then I disagree that mozilla.org has committed "one of the dirtiest deeds... in open source so far", "theft", "corporate bullying" and "the filthiest of dirty tricks".

its *obvious* that your implicatoin was that you wanted people to flood mozilla memebers with email, why else would you post their contact info? people could already get all this contact info from the mozilla site, the only motivation for you to pull it all together was to organise a massive astroturf campaign, which is what we are seeing right here. dont be so disingenious.

First I Love the Browser once know as Phoenix; I writing this using a 0.6nigthly.
But the name change is a fail. If they think that Firebird Trademark make it safe is ridiculus.
Is obvious that with a TradeMark the Original Firebird Database team couldn't do so much Legally
they maybe don't have the money to hire lawers for this. But in the Open Source is the Legal part
the most important?. Is not the cooperation between all the parts ( programers, designer, users, etc).

I have been following this "controversy" for the past day or so and have finally gotten fed-up to the point where I just have to comment. This is no doubt the silliest "controversy" I have ever seen. We have people accusing the Moz developers of not doing their homework when choosing a name. They write web browsers for gawd-sake! They probably know how to look stuff up on Google. The Firebird DB group feels that their project will suffer because of the name choice. Yea right. This: firebird.sourceforge.net/ is really hard to tell from this: mozilla.org/projects/firebird/. OH the confusion! It is just a name. Mozilla-Firebird is still the best browser and Firebird DB is probably still just as good a project/app when it only shared the Firebird name with 5 other products. If you have a problem with the Mozilla browser being named Firebird change your prefs so it presents itself as something else on your desktop - there, problem solved. Me I could care less what is called - the best browser remains the best no matter what you call it. A thought: do IE users have this much fun with their browser? Enough Already
MIchael

All this bickering and arguing isn't doing anything but annoying the Mozilla folks, and inflating the egos of the Firebird DB folks.

Why is a trademarked name so important in the business world? Because CompanyB could piggy-back on the success of CompanyA by using a similar name for their product and confuse the masses into thinking they were buying from the successful CompanyA instead of CompanyB. This is *not* what's going on here. If anything, the Firebird DB people are getting a great deal more publicity and name recognition out of this (I'd never heard of them until now, at least), and should probably thank the Mozilla folks for this opportunity to take the spotlight. The Mozilla Firebird browser project, is getting nothing but a black eye over this fuss (so yes, because of this it was a bad move); they are certainly not trying to cash in on the success and name recognition of the Firebird DB project. Note: I am not saying the Firebird DB project doesn't deserve recognition on its own merits (I wouldn't know -- never heard of it until a couple days ago); just making the observation that it apparently hasn't until now, at least not on this scale.

And lastly; if I were to walk into my local Home Depot and tell them I was looking to buy windows, they would not hand me something from Microsoft. Everything is known by its context. Mozilla Firebird belongs in the web browser store, the Firebird DB project belongs in the DB store. There's not going to be a whole lot of confusion -- these stores aren't even in the same strip mall.

Besides, this whole worthless attitude of hate directed from one project's followers to another (truly, the antithesis of a Care Bear Stare) is doing nothing constructive. Unless the intent was indeed to sound like a bunch of nit-picky children and give me a headache. If that is the case, then I say unto you all, "job well done!"

Clarification: I admit my post made it sound like I was only annoyed with those arguing a pro-Firebird DB position. I am annoyed with the bitching and whining from both sides of the fence -- the pro-Mozilla Firebird arguing, and the pro-Firebird DB arguing.

Unlike other commerical product, it is not as simple as a band name to a product.

Any 'open sourced' project need its name as a banner and be a symbol of the unity. The stronger is the unity in the community of the project, the stronger the strength is would be if it is offensed. What do you expect if OS/software name like 'linux' being used or owner by a guy or company other than Mr. Linus.

I am happy with the great and excellent works from mozilla, but it would be much much nicer to see the 'open sourced' development teams would work hands in hands.

why did they chose 1) a name that was already in common usage for other software and non software project? 2) use a common, obvious plane english word? They pretty much threw away any moral or legal claim of sole usage when they did this... complain to ibphoenix not mozilla.

I don't want to direct this straight to Asa as I get the impression from his posts that his position is that legally he's ok, he want to tough it through, and we (firebird) don't have the money to put up a legal fight. - so a post to him will have no effect - other than a "polite" thank you reply.

Im sorry that your lawyers advise that you will have less trouble with us over firebird than you will have with phoenix and I think you need to seriously reconsider your position.

Your decision (if you decide to proceed) to hijack our project name will certainly cause a lot of confusion certainly amongst our end users and more than likely amongst your users.

Besides how would you feel if IBM renamed DB2 as Mozilla or Microsoft decided to rename Powerpoint as Mozilla - no name confusion there either!

Some examples of confusing areas:

1. I can see mozilla users ending up at firebird.sourceforge.net looking for information on mozilla-firebird.

2. I can see much confusion between news and list names : see

http://www.mozillazine.org/forums/index.php?c=4

vs:

http://www.firebirdsql.org/index.php?op=lists

That will seriously muck up google searches for "firebird" and "download" for instance, as well as us (and you) getting user requests for browers/databases in both our general newslists.

3. I can see package confusion occuring on most linux distributions. install which firebird rpm?

4. I don't want to spend the rest of my life explaining to people that firebird (our project) is not a web browser.

So despite what Asa says, there will be great confusion amongst users, which will expecially be felt by our end user and developer communities.

I think the general angst and outrage felt by our community at having their name stolen is shown by the pith and vineger in many of their statements in recent days.

So overall, the fact that the lawyers say you can get away with it, is a poor excuse to come and trample over our namespace. Leave firebird alone as it is already taken, and if you need a new name, try using mozilla or if you need to do the marketting think of changing name every six months, try using Microsoft SQLServer, Oracle or DB2, and see how their users like it.

Your being a tad unkind, we did a fair bit of work to figure out if we were going to tread on anyones toes - we were in a similar posiiton to yourselves, having to get out of the way of an existing trademark (in our case InterBase(r)).

I agree with you that "swipe" is fairly descriptive of what your management team is trying to do to our name - is that sort of action, deliberately trouncing another project, something you feel happy about being involved with?

everyone understands that there were already existing publically known software projects using the word firebird before you chose it, so there are only 2 choices here: A) both mozilla and you guys are guilty of "stealing" the name and you should both be slapped on the wrist, or B) neither are guilty as all the firebird products exist in different spaces and hence dont conflict.

so, you choose. is the firebird project guilty of the "sleazy name theft" that you guys are whineing about or not?

> Besides how would you feel if IBM renamed DB2 as Mozilla or Microsoft decided to rename Powerpoint as Mozilla - no name confusion there either!

That is not a correct comparrison. To make it comparable your suggestions would have to be
DB2 - Mozilla
Powerpoint - Mozilla
and I'm sure that the mozilla people would be just thrilled about the HUGE totally free advertising it would give them. And even if they didn't like it they wouldn't condone a DOS attack on either of the companies like you have over at FB DB.

> I can see mozilla users ending up at firebird.sourceforge.net looking for information on mozilla-firebird

But you can't see your DB users and moz users alike ending up att http://www.firebird.com or .org or .net?
Talk about confusion there...

> I can see package confusion occuring on most linux distributions. install which firebird rpm?

I use Gentoo and I would just write "emerge dev-db/firebird" or "emerge net-www/firebird" (or more likely "emerge net-www/mozilla-firebird")

What crappy linuxdist do you use where you can't tell a browser from a database before you install it?

> I don't want to spend the rest of my life explaining to people that firebird (our project) is not a web browser.

Did you consider adding a FAQ to your webpage...
It's not like "FIREBIRD" just spells "DATABASE" in every persons head across the world.

> So overall, the fact that the lawyers say you can get away with it, is a poor excuse

The poor excuse is that you are making all this comotion becuse you are "hurt" buy your name being "stolen", when in fact you are just squeezing out every possible ounce of free publicity for your DB this has given to you. However I would take care so your rabiant attitude and condoning of DOS attacks doesn't backfire...

When I install a software package I don't expect to find a car in my garrage. From my (admitadly limted experience) with trademarks just both being in the software industry is enough evidence for customer confusion. So I think your (managements) legal advice that you have clear claim to a trademark is misleading.

We know firebird is used by other related industries. However, 3 years ago, we did deliberately search for a name that was going to cause minimal conflict, in the software and opensource development world - and over the last three years that has proved to be the case.

I find it curious that comming out of a software name dispute over phoenix, your quite happy to start another one with your new choice.

> The poor excuse is that you are making all this comotion becuse you are "hurt" buy your name
> being "stolen", when in fact you are just squeezing out every possible ounce of free publicity for
> your DB this has given to you. However I would take care so your rabiant attitude and
> condoning of DOS attacks doesn't backfire...

I've seen a lot of people over the last three year put in a lot of unpaid work to build up the firebird project to where it is today under difficult circumstances. So yep you bet your life I'm annoyed with someone setting up a campain to try and steal our name just becuase they think they are a bigger fish in the pond.

I personally stuck through using Mozilla all through the 8.X days when every occasion I'd get my mail zapped, etc, just because I prefer to support opensource software.

So currently Im intensly disapointed with the poor attitude displayed by both your management team, for putting together this hijack of our name, and some of the the ill informed comment, by some of your more zealous advocates, such as claiming we actually in this for the publicity. Not my previous experience of using and working with Mozilla.

So think up your your own name, and for pete's sake at least do a google search to see if your going to conflict with someone in the software industry and opensoruce world first.

I'm signing up all the Firebird DB people for classes in Logic at their respective local community colleges. If they still don't catch a clue, it will be Business Law next, then Trademark Law.

If they are still on this trip after those 3 classes, I'm signing them up for Political Science. If learning about logical arguments doesn't help them and Business and Trademark Law knowledge doesn't change anything, then I feel they are destined for lives in politics. They are obviously capable of holding a point of view "just because".

> When I install a software package I don't expect to find a car in my garrage....
... just becuase they think they are a bigger fish in the pond.

Which pond is that? The "open source pond" ???
When did you last decide you would download a random open source program?

People download software not solely becuse it's open source, but for a specific use (though they can choose a OSS over a non OSS that fills the same target use, which eg I often do).
There is no risk what so ever that any potential user will confuse a webbrowser and DB software.

> So I think your (managements) legal advice that you

For the record I'm not involved in moz development.

> and some of the the ill informed comment, by some of your more zealous advocates, such as claiming we actually in this for the publicity.

Well, all the reasons you have given sofare are as thin as water so the only realistic reason for your strong commitment in raising hell over this that remains is the PR it gives.
And if we are to talk about zealous advocates for something, I'm sure you've read this page ... http://www.ibphoenix.com/main.nfs?a=ibphoenix&page=ibp_Mozilla0

"Besides how would you feel if IBM renamed DB2 as Mozilla or Microsoft decided to rename Powerpoint as Mozilla - no name confusion there either!"

I doubt that would happen. As I understand it, invented words like 'Mozilla' or 'Xerox' have much stronger protection than existing words. If you want a practical demonstration, open a flower shop called 'Coca-Cola' and wait for the lawyers to call.

its been used in dozens of products before, and many more will use it in the future. a browser and a db are not in the same product space. its your own damned fault for using a generic english word, period, end of discussion.

OK, it's very clear that firebird is a bad name. Take your loss and drop it ASAP. Firebird has 0 marketrecognition now anyway, and IMHO it is not a very good name. Hijacking other peoples brandnames is not a nice thing to do regardless of the legalities.

The reason these laws are in place is to avoid people "hijacking" others' names. We're cool with the law, so it's a done deal. If you don't think the laws are broad enough, write your congressman and take a valium.

Reading the news i didn't believe what i read. Mozilla change there name to Firebird while this name is already in use by another very active open-source project which also has a same deployment-target.
Why is Mozilla doing these kind of wierd actions ?

Reading the news i didn't believe what i read. Mozilla change there name to Firebird while this name is already in use by another very active open-source project which also has a same deployment-target.
Why is Mozilla doing these kind of wierd actions ?

To all the Firebird DB people asking us how we would feel if Microsoft renamed "Internet Explorer" Mozilla (or some other unlikely occurance), how do you think we feel about having a BIOS company tell us to change the name of our browser?

There's been discussion on the name change for months, and god knows there's been some stupid suggestions for names (we voted Phallus to be the worst, although personally I would of rather used Phallus than MozJunior). There's an obvious similarity between the names Phoenix and Firebird (and many of the Firebird logos actually look more like a Phoenix than the dictionary definition of Firebird), so it's no suprise that a lot of the people using Phoenix wanted a name as similar as possible. There just aren't that many good names out there, and I'm afraid we're going to have to share some of them.

As for the Firebird database having wide market recognition that's going to be harmed by this, I'm afraid that's just not true. I'm a Java developer and we use quite a few opensource tools. I have heard of the Firebird database, but only because JBoss comes with a configuration for it - however, a quick poll around the office shows that I'm the only one who has heard of it. Now MySQL, Postgress are a different matter and we use MySQL for quite a few things. I'm not in any way suggesting that the Firebird database has anything wrong with it - I've not used it so I'm not in a position to judge it's technical merits, I'm just saying that this is probably the most publicity it's ever received. Lets face it, the average computer user hasn't got a clue about Mozilla.

All this flaming and spamming does nothing but create bad will between people who support Free Software - OK, I read slashdot so I know that's what we're good at. If you think some of the Mozilla project leaders sound a bit forceful, well don't you think they're fed up with discussing name changes (they've had to go through this with Camino/Chimera as well) and all the work that's involved. And the reason for mentioning that it's been cleared with AOL/TW legal is because of the problems with previous names and not because we're trying to stomp on people already using the Firebird name.

Also it's kind of sad that the online media (Paul Festa at CNet again!) like to jump on this disagreements and fan the flames - they're doing great work for Microsoft and Oracle.

That poll is ridiculously unbalanced. As I've said elsewhere, bleeding hearts are coming out of the woodwork to create memberships just to "vote". I haven't even voted; why? Because it's a moot point. The name is changed. No amount of crying on your part is going to change that.

Unfortunately most of the people posting in the discussion won't know what I mean, and the reason is that most of them have probably never been to this site before. So really what they think about the name of a Mozilla browser isn't as important as what the users of Mozilla think.

You should applaude the fact that the poll has the option for
"They shouldn't have picked the same name as the open-source Firebird relational database".

If enough actual Mozilla/Phoenix users vote for that option then I think there's a good case for arguing that the name should change. Unfortunately now that the poll has had input from a lot of unhappy Firebird database users it can't be used as a measure of Mozilla user opinion. Oh well, it's not like anyone sane would ever take the results of a mozillaZine poll too seriously.

Contrary to what you think, I care that we've upset the Firebird database users. However, each flame or insult makes me care a little less. Perhaps it will result in a name change, but all I know for sure is that you'll lose some goodwill from Mozilla users and perhaps next time they're looking at Open Source databases they'll be less likely to consider Firebird (I'm not saying that's right, but it's probably true).

all these new users who came here as part of an organised astroturf campaign to complain dont realise how painfully obvious it is to us regulars precisly becuase they are not regulars. i recognize 90% of the names on a normal day around here, the last 24 hours i've seen all kinds of new nicks... coincidence? not.

"Contrary to what you think, I care that we've upset the Firebird database users."

Does wolves like piglets and HOW does they like them...

"However, each flame or insult makes me care a little less. Perhaps it will result
in a name change, but all I know for sure is that you'll lose some goodwill from
Mozilla users and perhaps next time they're looking at Open Source
databases they'll be less likely to consider Firebird (I'm not saying that's right,
but it's probably true)."

It starts to be like kid's squabble in the sand-box. Should I say
there are many browsers but only one multigeneretional architecture
RDBMS, so I'll just issue order to use Opera only in my company to avoid
software and support conflicts? Should others database application
developers insert into customer's documentation on their
programs phrase: "If you take more care in your corporative data
than in comfort looking pictures in Internet you should'nt install
Mozilla Firebird. Price for support computers where it is installed
is payed twice in compare with our official price"? Nice relationship
between OS projects. Dave Fuler (Borland) is already happy due to Mozilla
decision, let's make happy Bill Gates?

From the last message :
Posted: Fri 7th Mar 2003 7:41pm
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The name has been chosen, we'll let you know what it is soon. Thank you, drive through.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

This meant the name isn't choosen by all that people in the thread. I've read some first and last pages from the thread, but i see only a lot of name suggestions, but no Firebird in these pages is writen. Isn't that wierd !

Also this confirmed that the months where everybody is talking about isn't true. Just look at the timestamp from the post.

and use the SEARCH function of the board if you want to know what you're talking about.

here's the top 5 list with Firebird in the lead:
http://dweb.digitalrice.com/phx_top5names.txt
the topic where this list is based on can also be found with help of the search function. it's called something like "pick your Top 5".

you are right, the name wasnt chosen by the users, it was chosen by the devs, but the devs listened to the users.

nonetheless its in the lead.. what would be your alternative? calling it "Sphinx Fox" because Sphinx + Fox = 53 votes?

if you would have followed the name discussion for months like I did, you wouldnt post what you are posting know.. it wasnt my favorite name like I already said ("Px" was nice imo), but the majority ("majority" is not "everyone" of course) liked the name, it was brought up and suggested again and again, and this was why it was chosen by the devs.. the database project was also mentioned several times, but no one really saw a problem with it, because, well, it's a database.. our problem was that there was already a "Phoenix" BROWSER, so you might understand why no one saw a DATABASE that is absolutely unrelated to web browsers as a problem.

No, it's not clear that "most of the people in the community don't want the name." Most of the MOZILLA community could A) care less or B) like the name or C) like it better than Phallus. Most of the people posting here are NOT the Mozilla community, and those that are are by and large in favor of the DB folks going home.

You expected to find the new version of Phoenix in the section titled Windows Files: Business: Databases? OK. Sounds like you were confused before you even got there if you went looking for a web browser in a section for databases.

Today we released the RC1 on bettanews . And Yes the project was registered on March 17th 2003 on betta news section .
(we didn't thought that there will be another Firebird) . It seems that we have to *RENAME* it to FireBirdSQL or FireBird True Relational Database or revert to
Jim's Relational Database (This was the first name of the Interbase when Jim Starkey worked at DEC ) or Groton Database System
(What database ? *Rotten...? This is what clients heard on the phone ..they cut the G..Heheh ) . We all hope the namespace clash problem to be soved soon .
We think the open source needs a directory whith all the NAMES taken so when you make a new Open Source to Choose a Unique Name .

I agree, something like that would have been really smart of you even from the get go.
"FireBird" gives absolutely no hint at it being a DB. FireBird SQL would leave noone (with a remote chance of being a user) clueless of what type of software it is.

"Please note that the Firebird artical is asking for posts ONLY to the Firebird-general list and that reiterating out of date information will not help the situation!"

When the update was posted to this article, the Firebird Admins' statement did suggest mailing several Mozilla people and forums. MozillaZine's later article http://www.mozillazine.org/talkback.html?article=3086 has an update that addresses the group's newer stance.